cs_summit 2 CS:GO Preview

6 February 2018 10:29

The cs_summit 2 begins on Thursday 8th February at Summit House, Los Angeles, with eight teams fighting it out for the biggest slice of the $150,000 prize pool. The four-day event sees double-elimination best-of-three clashes leading all the way up to the best-of-five grand final.

SK Gaming were crowned cs_summit 1 champions in April 2017, taking home $63,750 after beating Gambit Esports 3-1 in the grand final, so are you predicting a similar outcome this time around, or will another CS:GO team take the title home?

The Teams

The eight teams competing at cs_summit 2 are shown below, along with their overall odds of winning the major outright:

Cloud9 – 11/4

Team Liquid – 12/1

Ninjas in Pyjamas – 13/2

North – 4/1

SK Gaming – 11/8

Vega Squadron – 33/1

Heroic – 33/1

Torqued – 100/1

All eight teams received direct invitations to the event, apart from Heroic. mousesports who were supposed to be attending after beating Heroic 2-0 in the LOOT.BET Cup 2 grand final but, after mousesports declared themselves unable to attend, Heroic have taken their place after finishing as runners-up.

Torqued have taken the place of OpTic Gaming, who have withdrawn from their second tournament in a week after also giving up their place in the IEM Katowice North American qualifiers for undisclosed reasons.

Teams will be battling in the Cache, Cobblestone, Inferno, Mirage, Nuka, Overpass and Train maps.

Prize Pool

The $150,000 prize pool is split between the eight teams based their overall standings:

1st - $63,750

2nd - $33,750

3rd - $19,500

4th - $15,000

5th and 6th - $5,250

7th and 8th - $3,750

Who will be named HLTV MVP?

SK Gaming’s Marcelo "coldzera" David is favourite with some bookmakers to be named the HLTV MVP (Most Valuable Player). Priced at 4/1 to do so, the Brazilian-born rifler and AWPer enjoyed a stellar 2017 alongside his teammates as SK triumphed in several tournaments including the ESL Pro League Season 6 – Finals, Intel Extreme Masters XII – Sydney and EPICENTER 2017.

Elsewhere, North’s 19-year-old Danish rifler Markus "Kjaerbye" Kjærbye is 10/1 to be awarded the HLTV MVP accolade. He struggled somewhat alongside his North teammates in 2017, winning the ELEAGUE Major: Atlanta 2017 at the beginning of the year before six finishes ranging between 2nd and 4th place in tournaments for the rest of the year.

Supporters of Cloud9 will be pleased to see Jacky "Stewie2K" Yip priced at 12/1 to be named MVP. The 20-year-old rifler has only been with Cloud9 since January 2016 but he’s enjoyed plenty of success since his switch from Splyce, playing his part in winning the likes of DreamHack Open Denver 2017, ELEAGUE Major: Boston 2018 and iBUYPOWER Masters 2017.

What happened in cs_summit 1?

The upcoming cs_summit 2 follows on from last year’s cs_summit 1, held in April 2017 at the same Californian venue. There weren’t any group stages, only play-offs, and it was SK Gaming who prevailed after overcoming TeamEnVyUs, Cloud9 and Gambit Esports in the quarter, semi and winner’s finals, before seeing off Gambit once again in the grand final.

SK Gaming – captained by 26-year-old AWPer and In-game Leader Gabriel "FalleN" Toledo - clearly have the knowhow and experience on this stage and in this venue having already won the lion’s share of the prize pool once before, but whether they can do it again is another question. It’s arguably harder to win a tournament for a second successive year than win it for the first time, and all the other teams will be gunning for SK’s scalp to make sure they don’t secure back-to-back cs_summit titles.